This invention lies in the field of furniture in a broad sense being applicable in domestic or personal applications, in office or business applications, hotels and in general any other applications.
For many years already "do-it-yourself" furniture has been available the concept being the manufacture and supply of components for furniture which are assembled by the purchaser after purchase. This allows some reduction of the price of the furniture since the manufacturer and supplier does not have to provide the assembly thereof and some advantage in storage and transport of the furniture in a collapsed state since it is usually more compact in that stage than when assembled.
All of such furniture is, however, akin to conventional furniture in being purpose made, that is it is made to provide one article of furniture of a particular kind. Thus having purchased even a "do-it-yourself" or collapsible item of furniture one can only make that particular item by assembling the components or disassemble them and later reassemble them into the component; one cannot make a different article of furniture from the components.
The inventors in the present case have perceived changes in the market for furniture, for example, the pace of change in circumstances affecting businesses is ever increasing; with concomitant increases in the standards of living and of facilities and accommodation in business, cost levels are increasing requiring greater economy in the floor area available for furniture and in the utilisation of furniture. In addition, due to the heightened pace of change which is being referred to, pressure is added to more frequently change the furnishing of premises. These tendencies in business and commercial circumstances find their counterpart even in domestic situations where increasing standards of living are sought with the implication of increasing costs of living and an expectation on top of this of change and improvement in furnishings at a pace not expected in earlier times.
Young families, which have young children tend to need to cater for a small budget and to provide for changing and development of the furniture as the children grow, providing new functional and aesthetic characteristics. The problem existing in the art is that common "do-it-yourself" or knock-down furniture cannot cater for such needs.